36. Chester
Chester
B ailey and I chatted idly as we made our way down the street and into a local park.
Even in the depths of winter, it was a beautiful place.
Huge amounts of green space were surrounded by tree lined walkways and various shrubs and flowerbeds hinted at a riot of colour during the spring and summer months.
The florist in me was dying to go and investigate some of them closer.
“This is beautiful,” I said to Bailey as we made our way along one of the paths. “Much nicer than Pompey.”
“Don’t let them hear you say that.” Bailey chuckled. “Never known a rivalry quite like the one between Portsmouth and Southampton.”
I laughed along with him, shoving my hands into my pockets to try and stave off the cold. It was milder than the Highlands, but still bitter enough to make me regret not bringing gloves. “What did you want to talk to me about?”
Bailey answered my question with another. “Am I right in thinking you’re in a relationship with Finn, but that you’re not his mate?”
My guard went up immediately. “Yes. We’re not mates yet, but that doesn’t change anything. I love him with everything I am.”
Bailey hummed. “I’m guessing you’re holding off on the mating bond because of what you went through with Matt?”
I wrestled with myself. I hated opening up to people, especially those I’d only just met.
But Bailey was the one person who had an idea of what I’d been through.
It might not have been to the same extent, but he understood what Matt was like.
“Yes, but not because I think Finn is anything like him. I know he’d never treat me the same way. ”
“You’re right.”
I side-eyed him. “I know why I’m so certain, but why are you? Didn’t you meet him for the first time today?”
“Yeah.” Bailey smiled. “But you learn quickly in this life that supes fall into two categories. The first are the conniving, selfish kind. The ones who will do anything to get more power. The second are like Harlow. Loyal to a fault. Fiercely protective. Often stubborn, but always reliable. I suspect Finn belongs in that second category.”
“What makes you so sure?”
“Are you saying he isn’t like that?”
“Of course he is,” I said with a bite of impatience. “But how did you come to that conclusion after one conversation?”
“Because Harlow, Cal, and all the others have accepted him already,” he said simply. “They can sniff out someone dangerous at fifty paces. They trust him, which means I do. Plus, he’s close to Danny. He doesn’t put up with twats, so Finn must be okay.”
I couldn’t fault his logic. “Fair enough.”
“Anyway, I didn’t bring you out here to grill you about your relationship status. I want to tell you about how Harlow and I got together.”
“Okay.” I wasn’t sure what that had to do with me, but I’d happily listen. Perhaps this would be the start of another friendship.
Reid would be so proud of me.
“Like I said earlier, what I went through with Matt wasn’t on the same level as what you experienced.” Bailey kept walking, his steps brisk. “But I left the relationship with a lot of scars and warped beliefs about myself.”
“Like what?” I flushed immediately. “Sorry, that’s probably inappropriate.”
“Nah it’s fine.” He shrugged. “It bothered me for a long time, but it doesn’t now. I can thank Harlow for that. It’s not something I generally bring up, but I suspect you might’ve heard similar from him. He’d go on about how I was overweight, how my body shape wasn’t what he perceived to be ideal.”
I scowled down at my shoes. Hearing that he’d said those things to Bailey made me feel oddly angrier than the knowledge that he’d said the same to me. Why was it easier to see how wrong it was when it was happening to someone other than yourself?
“He even belittled me for my choices in the bedroom,” Bailey continued. “Shamed me for wanting to bottom. Said I was too fat for anyone to want to fuck.”
My feet slammed to a stop. “He really said that?”
“Yep.” Bailey realised I was no longer beside him and twisted to face me. “You okay?”
“Yeah.” I swallowed down the bile rising. “It’s just…he said the same to me.”
Bailey cursed under his breath. “Fucker never changed. I’m so sorry. You know it’s bullshit now though, right? ”
“Um, yeah.” I gave a nervous laugh. “Finn’s kind of shattered that belief for me.”
Bailey flashed me his teeth in a grin. “Good. Harlow did the same for me.”
I forced my feet to start moving. “Why did you break up?”
“Caught him cheating.” Bailey shuddered. “Worse—he was topping the guy.”
“What a fucking cunt,” I seethed. “How dare he? So it wasn’t that he didn’t like to top, he just didn’t want to top us. What the fuck was wrong with us?”
“Nothing,” Bailey said fiercely. “The fault was with him, Chester. Not you and me.”
“I’m sorry.” I exhaled slowly. “Both that he cheated on you and for reacting like that.”
“It’s fine, really. For what it’s worth, the guy he was fucking was a twink. I think it was a power dynamic thing for him. He wanted to control us, even in the bedroom, because we were bigger than him. Proving that size doesn’t matter or some bullshit.”
“Such bollocks,” I said. Logan was one of the most petite guys I knew and he fucking terrified me sometimes. From the little bits I’d picked up about Harlow, I was guessing he had a similar reputation.
“Indeed. After Matt, I decided relationships weren’t for me. I didn’t want anything more than a one-night stand. I thought I was happy like that, but in reality I was damn lonely.”
“And then you met Harlow?”
“And then I met Harlow.” Bailey had a goofy grin on his face. “He walked in and turned all my preconceived notions about relationships on their heads. So, naturally, I ran away. ”
“You what?”
“You heard me,” he said shortly. “We kissed in a club one night. The Closet, actually. And then I avoided him for six months.”
“Goodness,” I said, recalling something Finn had once told me. “Don’t demons have fated mates?”
“Yup.” Bailey shook his head sadly. “I didn’t know it at the time, of course, but it fucking killed Harlow to stay away from me.
All I knew was that he was too beautiful and bright to be weighed down by a loser like me.
” He shot me a crooked grin before I could protest. “Don’t worry, I know that’s not true now.
Harlow’s spent years erasing Matt’s narrative from my self-belief system. ”
Something Finn had been doing for me too. “I take it you got together eventually though.”
“Yeah. We became friends first, and then Harlow managed to sneak under my guard. It wasn’t an easy journey though. I fucked everything up completely before I realised I was being a muppet. I let Matt’s views colour my thinking for so long that I threw away the best thing to ever happen to me.”
“I’m sorry,” I said genuinely. “Having been in your shoes, I can see how easily that could happen.”
“You’re not thinking of leaving Finn, right?”
“Not at all, but…” I inhaled deeply, letting the crisp winter air settle me. “But it was hard letting him close. It’s not too much of a leap to see how you came to the decision to end things with Harlow.”
“I fucked it up so badly, but it wasn’t the worst mistake I made.”
“What was?”
“Not encouraging him to take me as a mate. I got caught up in an incident with another supe and…I died. ”
I shook my head, certain I must’ve misheard him. “You died?”
“Yep.” Bailey smiled sadly. “Like, properly died. I woke up in Hell and Harlow was left to find my body up here.”
“Holy shit.” I rubbed at my chest. “That’s awful. He must’ve gone to pieces.”
“He did. Lost control completely. His brothers had to kill him repeatedly just to stop him burning the world down.”
I thought back to the cheerful man who’d greeted me with such warmth and generosity. “Fuck, I’m so sorry. I hate that you both went through that.”
“Me too,” he sighed. “Obviously it all worked out in the end, given I’m here, but Harlow and his brothers had to battle their way into Hell before I was saved. He mated me right there and then, knowing it’d either bring me back or kill him too.”
My vision went misty. “That’s some epic love right there.”
“It is. And it almost didn’t work. Many others helped bring me back to earth.”
“I’m glad it did work.”
“Me too,” he said. “But the point of my story is, it was because of me that we waited. It was my fault Harlow had nightmares every night for the next year.”
“You couldn’t have known you’d be killed.”
“No, but I could’ve accepted Harlow as my mate earlier.” He stopped and faced me. “I was waiting because Matt had fucked me up more than I’d realised. I’d created all these bullshit reasons we should wait, and it almost cost us both everything.”
He sighed before continuing. “What I’m saying is, if you know Finn is the one for you, don’t be frightened of it. What happened with Matt isn’t going to happen with Finn. You deserve happiness as much as everyone else. Maybe even more so.”
“It’s just so permanent,” I confessed. “What if he gets tired of me?”
“He won’t,” Bailey said firmly. “That’s not how a mating bond works. Besides, Matt’s taken so much from you, Chester. Are you going to let him take Finn too?”
I hadn’t looked at it like that. I didn’t need to think back far to remember how close Finn had already come to losing me. If Clyde had been a second faster than Evan, if he’d heard their approach, it could’ve ended very differently.
Was I willing to put Finn through that?
Fuck no.
I might have been scared about becoming his mate, but I was more scared of hurting him. Bailey was right, Matt had taken so much from me. He wasn’t taking this too. This was my life. Mine. And I wanted Finn to be a part of it.
Forever.
“No.” I grinned at Bailey. “No I’m fucking not.”
I started plotting on the walk back to the club. I could’ve just told Finn I wanted to be his mate as soon as I went back through the door, but I decided to wait one more day.